The Thin Red Line

I am Way over due to give some link love to Claire. I has noticed that her simple but very clever cartoons reminded me of Eric Carle’s work and had intended to dedicate a review of Carle’s newest board book, but that was the day the computer and Earthlink ate my post three times and I ended up posting only a hastily written note describing how difficult it had been to post that day. So when Claire teamed up with Chelle on their newest photo contest– What Was Willy Reading? , I just knew this library drone would Have to provide some insight into Willy’s reading list….

Willy, bless his soul, is not always as precise as he might be and has been known at times to confuse 5–6 inches with 8–9 inches, but if there’s one thing he knows for sure it’s that Bigger Is Better and the books Willy brought home from the library certainly are in keeping with that brand of wisdom. Measuring a full 12 inches square and 2 inches thick and weighs a Ton Frank Lloyd Wright: The Houses quite appealed to Willy. While the rather dry academic architecture writing by Alan Weintraub was a bit over Willy’s, errrr, head the many stunning photos of these extrordinary homes by Alan Hess kept Willy turning the pages and thinking he would kind of like to have one of the less weird of Wright’s creations.

While not Weighing quite as much as the Wright tome, Willy’s second selection– William Matthews Working The West, at 11 x 13 inches is an even more over-sized coffee table book, featuring Matthews’ evocative water color paintings of classic working men of the American West of the cowboy-rancher variety. The quality of Matthews’ work is truly remarkable and Willy found himself quite admiring this art, though he was a bit bored and only skimmed the included essay by Annie Prolux, author of the short story "Brokeback Mountain", which was the basis of the movie with that same title.

Willy well knows that some of the most fun he’s ever had has taken place in Hotel rooms and as such his curiosity was peaked by A.K. Sandoval-Strausz’s history of hotels in the United States. Packed with all sorts of detail and presented in a very read-able story format Hotel tells the story paid lodgings from pre-colonial to present. If nothing else, this one would be suitable for that long day and night you are stuck at an airport inn waiting out a flight delay.

And finally, because Willy realizes that someday he would really like to own a house but is unlikely ever to be able to afford one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s, he was very interested in learning about prefab modern housing, which is available with luxury fixtures and finishes and can be installed on site in a matter of days for much, much less than stick built housing. Some of these homes were really cool and Willy intends to start seriously looking into it, as soon as his royalty checks start to roll in. Ladies, I hope this sheds some insight into what your Willy is actually likely to be reading and best of luck with your contest.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 12th, 2008 at 1:30 am and is filed under Armchair Travel, Book Reviews, Books, Humor and Memes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.